Official Title

Summary:

Patients with primary hepato-biliary malignancies or liver metastases from gastrointestinal
cancer suffer substantial morbidity and mortality from their hepatic disease. Curative
resection is feasible only for selected subgroups of patients. The majority of patients have
unresectable and incurable disease. Aggressive arterial and systemic chemotherapy have been
used in recent years with improved response and survival. However, a significant number of
patients, at least one-third of patients with liver metastases from colorectal cancer and
two-third or higher of unresectable hepatobiliary cancer, continue to die of liver failure
from progressive disease in the liver. Percutaneous ethanol injections, chemoembolization,
cryotherapy and thermal ablation using radiofrequency have been used to treat selected
patients with smaller tumours (3-4 cm) in areas away from major blood vessels and the biliary
tract. However, most unresectable liver cancers did not fit the criteria for these
treatments. Therefore, other regional therapeutic option like external radiation therapy may
be considered for local control in the liver or symptom palliation